A floor scrubber hires for roughly $75 to $150 a day and $250 to $450 a week in walk behind form, with monthly terms priced near three weeks. The term you pick matters more than the machine on most jobs, because scrubbing is rarely a one afternoon task. What the machine cannot do matters just as much before you book it.
Why almost nobody should hire one by the day
A single day covers a one off clean of a small unit and little else. Anything involving a warehouse, a repeated shift pattern or a building handover runs into the week rate, which typically costs about three to four days, and a month costs near three weeks. Book the longer term and return early rather than extending twice.
What a scrubber will not fix
It removes loose soil, film and traffic marks from a sound, sealed surface. It will not lift old wax build up, restore a worn coating, clean deep grout lines that sit below the pad, or take up adhesive. Those are stripping, grinding or scraping jobs with different machines, and hiring a scrubber for them wastes the week.
Pads, detergent and the charger are separate questions
The pad or brush is matched to the floor rather than the machine, detergent is usually your own, and a battery unit needs its charger and somewhere to plug in overnight. Cord machines avoid the charging question and add a trailing lead. Confirm all three at the counter, because a rider with no charger is a half shift.
Who moves it, and in what
A walk behind scrubber is heavy enough that it wants a van with a ramp or yard delivery, and once inside it has to fit through the doors and into the lift. Measure the narrowest doorway on the route and the lift capacity before choosing deck width. Delivery is charged each way and is often worth it.
Questions people ask about rent floor scrubber
What size floor scrubber do I need?
Match deck width to the area and the obstacles: a narrow deck for aisles and rooms, a wider one for open floor. Bigger decks clean faster but turn worse and may not pass a doorway. Give the yard the square footage and the tightest access point and let them size it.
Do I need to sweep before scrubbing?
Yes. A scrubber recovers liquid, not debris, and grit under the pad scratches the floor and shortens the pad life. Sweep or use a dust mop first, and on a construction clean run a sweeper over it. Skipping that step is the usual reason a first pass looks poor.
Where does the dirty water go?
Into a recovery tank you empty at a suitable drain, following the site's rules for waste water. Filling and emptying take longer than people plan for, particularly on upper floors. Ask the tank capacity and work out how many fills your floor area needs before you book the term.